Industrial Revolution arose in Europe as a consequence of very specific conditions for its realisation, which were created in the course of the historical development. One of these characteristic European traits, which differed from those in other high cultures, was the comparatively strong position of women in society. There arises the question, wether this fact caused repercussions for the In...

We analyze the evolution of economic institutions during the process of industrialization. In particular, we focus on the institution of contract enforcement. Empirically, we show that, during the process of industrialization, countries tend to shift their manufacturing production towards industries that require more relationship-specific investment. Theoretically, we build a dynamic model with...

The industrialization process of a country is often plagued by a failure to coordinate investment decisions. Using the Global Games approach we can solve this coordination problem and eliminate the problem of multiple equilibria. We show how appropriate information provision enhances efficiency. We discuss extensions of the model and argue that subsidies may be a property of a signalling equili...